A version of this article was first published on silvent.com
Blowing with compressed air is commonly used in industry to clean large surfaces and hard to reach places. It’s convenient to use compressed air blowing for these otherwise difficult to clean areas. In such cases, manual blowing with an air blow gun, or air lance, is functional and easy to install, however, in some cases it is possible to improve the quality and efficiency of the air blowing by installing fixed air nozzles.
In applications demanding frequent, manual compressed air blowing, it is highly beneficial to install fixed air nozzles. Fixed nozzles improve the efficient use of compressed air, improve the quality of the blowing application, and saves valuable time for the operator. Two common blowing applications to improve with fixed air nozzle installations are cleaning and drying.
Cleaning with compressed air is very common in the manufacturing industry. The wide range of cleaning applications can be anything from blowing large surfaces to pointed blowing on small parts.
Pointed blowing is also useful to clean sensors and cameras on machines. Debris build-up on the photocells, sensors and cameras will negatively affect the production quality. Pointed blowing eliminates debris build-up, thereby improving the production quality and reducing product rejects.
For this type of blowing application, fixed air nozzles are more suitable than manual air blow guns. The cleaning can be done continuously, and consistently, ensuring an accurate reading during the manufacturing process.
Similar to cleaning applications, it’s also very common in industry to use compressed air blowing for drying. The drying result can suffer when being done manually with blowing pipes, air lances, or air blow guns. If the product is not dried sufficiently it will affect other production processes, and negatively affect the product quality.
Fixed air nozzle installations improve the quality and efficiency of drying applications. It is often possible to dry the product more completely and faster without stopping the production line. This results in a better working process and a more efficient use of costly compressed air.
There are many instances when fixed air nozzle installations should be used in place of manual air blowing guns. When installed correctly, fixed air nozzle solutions use less compressed air, make the production process more efficient, improve the blowing result, and increase the quality of the manufactured goods.